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In the Forum: Audio Discussions
In the Thread: RMAF 2008 observations, opinions 1) ceramic drivers

Post Subject: More Feastrex opinions from RMAF listeningPosted by serenechaos on: 10/19/2008

I'll try to make some comments on Feastrex Sound in this post.
It is always difficult for me to isolate the sound of the individual parts I want to analyze.
Like in this thread, which has partly evolved into the effect of all permendur on Feastres field coil drivers.
When @ RMAF two systems were set-up in two different rooms.
One used a back-loaded 9", and the other the 5" in the Nessie (two length tuned pipe) cabinet.
They had very different sounds--
I found the 9" unlistenable, much like a Fostex in a poor design box--boomy bass coming in around 100Hz, and a tizzy, shouty top end that hurt my ears.
--Within its frequency and dynamic limits, on material which was not too complex--
I found the 5" to be excellent. Very nice tone, detail, transients, response, harmonics,...
A great match for Asian culture/music? (see: http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=1955 Wink

Makoto Tanaka (Builder of the Nessie cabinet) was at the controls, playing bamboo flutes, bells & such. My wife requested a CD she was familiar with, and he played it, then a Nora Jones someone else had, and as the first track was ending, he turned to me, pointed to my bag and shrugged. I gave him a Rachmaninoff CD which I was sure would push the little single driver over its limits, but I wanted to see how it handled it. As the speakers started having trouble, he became very interested, ask to see the CD case, and wrote the name down.
It seems he was intrested in a test piece? We did the "talking with hands" thing, (no interpreter was in the room at that time) for a while, and he replayed the track, and played with the volume, listening for how they would handle dynamics, highs, lows, and complex parts.
Some of it went well, some not so well, but Makoto didn't mind "putting it through it's paces" and was quite aware of shortcomings.
(If anyone heard it then, they heard it at it's worst)
Listening to simpler chamber music, at lower volume, there were none of those problems at all.
And again, I will say it was the best sounding "full range" speaker I've ever heard.
I just still don't see the reason to handicap oneself to "full range" speakers...
Mr. Teramoto (maker of the drivers) came back (with an intrepreter), and I ask what was the difference between the 9" and 5" drivers, they sounded so different, that it wasn't just the boxes, or the size.
He said that the 5" was the most expensive field coil driver, and the 9" was the least expensive. AND, that pretty much everything in them was different...
The frames, the wire, the paper that the cones and whizzers are made from for example are processed ~200 times in the lower grade model, and ~400 times in the higher grade model.
--So, I wasn't just listening to "more permendur", and a larger driver, in a larger box, with a different amp, but a totaly different pair of speakers...

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